Many stupid crimes happen every day. And most of them are committed by stupid criminals.

Unfortunately most of the stories we never get to hear about, but occasionally we do.

Like this one, which must rank as one of the dumbest ever!

It happened in a place called Mullins, SC. The perpetrator, or would-be perpetrator, was a ‘genius’ called Laquain Deshawn Guy and he had the idea that he would rob an Arby’s fast food restaurant.

Lots of cash in there, he thought, not considering that most of the takings would be banked at the end of business.

That was his first mistake.

His second was failing to break into the restaurant using either a back door or a window.

No, this genius had a better idea.

He thought he would climb on to the roof of the building and gain entrance through the ventilation shaft. That is the story told by Captain Joe Graham with the Mullins police and I see no reason at all to doubt him.

The main reason being that criminal mastermind Laquain Deshawn Guy found to his surprise that he didn’t fit the ventilation shaft – and promptly wedged himself in there just as tight as he could.

The more he struggled the worse it got.

Man, was he stuck!

And he remained stuck for the next ten hours, until an Arby’s employee was opening the business Tuesday morning and he heard “noises”. I like to think that the noises were the farts being squeezed out of him as he got wedged in tighter and tighter, but nobody will confirm this.

The employee immediately called the police and that’s when they realized that the strange noises were coming from the very stuck Laquain still wedged inside the shaft.

Mullins Fire and Rescue eventually freed the idiot by cutting the ventilation pipe and pulling him through the roof, where he emerged dehydrated and with some muscle damage.

Crews then lowered him down and onto a stretcher and took him to hospital where he spent a few days before facing charges of Burglary Second Degree.

The Bible (Exodus 20:15) tells us that one of God’s Ten Commandments is that “Thou Shalt Not Steal”, and it is a rule that has been adopted almost universally. Theft is against the law and is punishable by imprisonment, or in some countries harsher treatment.

Maybe that’s part of what gets me so riled up about the banksters and the government stooges who won’t go after these thieves.

But it seems now that the governments themselves are testing the water for a grand theft of their citizens’ money.

I don’t just mean raising taxes, or hyping up environmental issues so they can bring in new taxes to eradicate problems that they themselves have created.

Yes, they are doing that, but it isn’t enough.

Governments throughout the western world have amassed so much debt by stupid policies and incompetent management of their economies that they are now contemplating out and out theft of YOUR money!

Don’t believe me?

Witness the goings on the other day with Cyprus and the EU.

If you haven’t heard, it all started Saturday when the people of Cyprus discovered that their government and a bunch of EU bureaucrats had conspired in secret to rob their savings accounts to pay for the country’s bailout.

Anyone with savings accounts of over 100,000 euros are to have 9.9% of its value seized, and those with less than 100,000 euros will have 6.75% stolen.

In other words if you are a Cypriot and have been careful and frugal with your money, as opposed to amassing large personal debt on credit cards and loans, you are to be punished by the government.

It all needs to be ratified by the Cypriot parliament, but whether or not they approve it on this occasion, the thinking and intent of the bureaucrats is clear.

They want to steal your money!

This is a big step. Previously raiding savings deposits was unheard of and unthinkable. Now it is an option that is very much on the agenda for desperate Western governments.

So be warned. If they set a precedent in Cyprus it could, and probably will, happen elsewhere.

And with the advance of technology it is soooo easy for governments to steal your money. If it is in a bank account it is just electronically stored numbers, there for the taking, or rather, the changing.

Just as a bit of a contrast to yesterday’s post, today I have ten stories, which are either about thieves who were smart enough to get away with it, or police who were too dumb to catch them.

The readers can make up their own minds.

Enjoy.

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1. Double Trouble

On Feb 25, 2009, three masked robbers boldly busted into Kaufhaus Des Westens, the second largest department store in Europe.

Via a rope ladder, the men were able to enter and ransack the main floor without tripping any sensors or alarms.

But what may have been a fatal error – leaving behind a single glove – ended up creating a bizarre situation.

DNA found on the glove matched TWO people: identical twins identified as Hassan and Abbas O.

German law however requires that each person be individually convicted and because their DNA is so similar, neither can be exclusively pinned to the evidence.

German police were forced to set them both free, and the third man has yet to be found.

identical twins – how do you tell them apart?

.2. The World’s Most Famous Fugitive

No, it’s not the one about Dr Richard Kimble trying to hunt down the one-armed man, although many readers may well be familiar with this story too which is about probably the world’s most famous fugitive.

On the night before Thanksgiving, November 24, 1971, a passenger by the name of Dan Cooper boarded a plane in Portland, OR bound for Seattle.

Clad in a suit and raincoat, wearing dark glasses and carrying a briefcase, he sat silently in the back of the plane. After calmly lighting a cigarette (yes smoking was permitted in airplanes in those days), he ordered a whiskey from the stewardess and then handed her a note.

It read, ‘I HAVE A BOMB IN MY BRIEFCASE. I WILL USE IT IF NECESSARY. I WANT YOU TO SIT NEXT TO ME. YOU ARE BEING HIJACKED.’

He demanded $200,000 and four parachutes delivered to him in Seattle.

When the plane landed, he released all the passengers, save for the pilot, co-pilot, and stewardess.

Once the money was delivered in the middle of the brightly-lit tarmac, Cooper demanded the pilot take off for Mexico, flying at an altitude of 10,000 feet.

Shortly after takeoff, over the mountains northwest of Portland, the six-foot-tall Cooper strapped on a parachute and jumped.

He was never heard from again.

Did he survive?

In 1980, roughly $6000 was found of the money in bundles on a beach, but no signs of a body.

The case remains open and is the only unsolved crime in US aviation history.

The Fugitive – The Illusive Dan Cooper

.3. Cops And Robbers – Boston Style

On March 18, 1990, the day after Saint Patrick’s Day, policemen arrived at the door of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, claiming to have received a call about a disturbance.

Breaking protocol, the security officer let them in.

One of the men said he had a warrant for the guard’s arrest, and they convinced him to step away from his post.

Bad move: the “policemen” were really criminals in disguise, and they quickly handcuffed him and ordered him to call the other guard to the front, who was also subdued.

The thieves absconded with 13 paintings, including masterworks by Rembrandt, Vermeer, and Degas, worth a third of a billion dollars.

To this date, no one has been arrested in conjunction with the crime, nor have the paintings ever been recovered.

Robbers dressed as cops – would they fool you?

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4. Cops And Robbers – Japanese Style

On December 10, 1968, in Tokyo, Japan, a Nihon Shintaku Ginko Bank car, transporting 300 million Yen ($817,000 US) in its trunk, was pulled over by a policeman on a motorcycle, who warned them of a bomb planted underneath.

Since there had already been bomb threats against the bank, the four passengers exited the vehicle as the uniformed patrolman inspected below the car.

Moments later, smoke and flames could be seen under the vehicle, causing the men to run for cover.

Of course, it turned out the smoke was from a flare and the cop was a phony.

He jumped in the car and sped off with the loot.

Even though there were 120 pieces of evidence, 110,000 suspects and 170,000 police investigators, the man was never caught.

In 1975, the statute of limitations ended, and in 1988 all civil liabilities were voided, but still no one ‘fessed up.

man under car

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5. Diamonds Are Forever – Unless Someone Steals Them

The largest diamond heist in history was stolen from the world’s most impenetrable vault, located in Antwerp, Belgium.

Two floors below the Diamond Centre, it was protected by a lock with 100 million possible combinations, as well as heat/motion sensors, radar, magnetic fields, and a private security force.

However, on the weekend of Feb 15, using a series of moves that would make Danny Ocean jealous, the thieves were able to silently enter the vault, bust open the safe deposit boxes, and make off with the glittering loot.

And although the purported ring leader Leonardo Notarbartolo was caught and sentenced to 10 years, he has since been released on parole.

Notarbartolo claimed in an interview in Wired Magazine that the true take was only $20 million and was part of a larger conspiracy involving insurance fraud.

Whatever — the loot was never recovered.

Diamonds are forever – sometimes!

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6. The Disappearing $million

On Friday October 7, 1977, before Columbus Day Weekend, a bank worker counted $4 million dollars in cash and stored it in a locked money cart within a heavily guarded vault, two floors below the Chicago First National Bank.

Then poof!

Tuesday morning, the money is counted again, and exactly $1 million dollars – in $50 and $100 dominations and weighing over 80 pounds – had vanished into thin air.

In 1981, $2300 of the money showed up in a drug raid, but otherwise both the perpetrators and the cash are still at large.

cash pile

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7. The Pink Panthers

The winner for boldest burglary goes to the perpetrators of the so-called Harry Winston Heist.

On December 4, 2008, four men, three of whom wore long blonde wigs and disguised themselves as women, charmed their way into the famous Harry Winston Paris jewelry store just before closing time.

Once inside, they brandished a .357 revolver and a hand grenade and began their pillaging.

Less than 15 minutes later they escaped with diamonds, rubies, and emeralds worth an estimated $108 million US.

Investigators believe it to be the work of the notorious Serbian criminal gang The Pink Panthers, responsible for $132 million in robberies around the world.

They have never been caught.

Obviously the police needed Inspector Clouseau on the case.

Inspector Clouseau

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8. Tucker Cross Or Double Cross?

The Tucker Cross, was named after diver Teddy Tucker who, in 1955, recovered it from the 1594 wreck of the San Pedro.

It was a 22-karat gold cross embedded with sparkling green emeralds and considered priceless.

Nonetheless, Tucker sold it to the Government of Bermuda for an undisclosed sum.

In 1975, the Cross was moved to the Bermuda Museum of Art to be displayed for Queen Elizabeth II.

No one knows when or how, but during this transition, a clever thief replaced the original with a cheap plastic replica.

Presumably, this historical artifact was melted down, stripped of its jewels, and funneled into the Black Market.

The Tucker Cross

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9. Fancy A Brazilian?

No, nothing to do with Kim Kardashian or the netherlands. This happened in 2005, in Fortaleza, Brazil at the Banco Central, when a gang of enterprising thieves managed to carry off one of the biggest heists of all time.

This heist was the result of painstaking planning by a small gang of burglars who tunneled over 250 feet to the bank’s vault from a nearby property.

The robbers used a landscaping business as a front that allowed them to move massive amounts of dirt and rock without looking suspicious.

The tunnel was expertly constructed and had sophisticated lighting and even an air conditioning system.

After three months of digging, the thieves finally broke into the vault and made off with what was equivalent to $70 million dollars.

Since then, police have made a number of arrests in connection with the burglary and recovered roughly $9 million dollars of the haul, but the majority of the suspects are still at large.

Part of the tunnel at the Banco Central – the police are looking into it!

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10. The Thieves Of Baghdad

On July 11th, 2007 in Baghdad a private financial institution, Dar Es Salaam, was robbed by two, or possibly three guards.

They got away with a third of a billion in cash, all US bills.

Perhaps the bank itself did not want people to start wondering where, how, and why it had so much cash at hand, so they have kept mum and there has been minimal press.

But somewhere, the successful thieves are laughing all the way from this bank.

In 1982 in Bel Air, Los Angeles, an ambitious burglar broke into one of the vast mansions on millionaire’s row.

This palatial structure was a veritable gold-mine of treasures and he immediately started to fill his sack with loot.

It all started off so well

He went through the ballroom and into the hall.

Then down the escalators to the single lane swimming arbour.

Up to the library.

Across the dining room, and out of the annex into the conservatory which contained sixty-three varieties of tropical plants and a cage-full of sulphur crested parrots.

After all that he decided that now was the time to make a quick exit with his ill-gotten gains.

He went back through the dining room.

Then up to the gymnasium and across the indoor tennis court.

Down a spiral staircase to an enclosed patio with synchronized fountains.

Out to the cocktail lounge and through junior’s sound-proofed drum studio, whereupon he found himself back into the room full of increasingly excited parrots that normally saw nobody from one day to the next.

Panicking slightly, he ran back towards the library and through swing doors into a gallery containing the early works of Jackson Pollock.

Then out through the kitchen, across a jacuzzi enclosure and up two flights of stairs.

Hysterical Burglar

At this point he became hysterical, ran outside along the balcony, around the circular corridors, up more stairs, down the landing into the master bedroom and woke up the owners to ask them how to get out.

In order to spare him further distress, they arranged for a local policeman to escort him from the premises.

Help is at hand

I think he spent the next few years also in another big building, but one with much smaller rooms.